Lou Holtz, of all people, dug up this hoary chestnut: if Auburn loses today’s Chick-fil-A Bowl, it will become the first defending national champion to lose six games the following season since the 1943 Ohio State Buckeyes. And as Granny put it, that happened during WWII, when you had entire team rosters that didn’t return the next season.

I just thought I’d mention in a very preliminary sort of way some stats and such to start getting ready for Tuesday’s Monday’s game. In no particular order, here goes:

The computers see the game as a pretty even match up. Sagarin has Georgia 18th and Michigan State 19th (although he likes MSU more when you factor margin of victory into the equation). Smart Football’s SRS has the Spartans at 15 and the Dawgs at 16. The F+ ratings at Football Outsiders have a little more spread, but not much: MSU ranks 10th and Georgia 14th.

The defenses are even; Georgia has a slight advantage in the offensive yardage stats. In total defense, you’re looking at the third and fifth best teams in the country. But Georgia ranks 37th in total offense, quite a bit higher than MSU’s showing at 60th.

However… Despite the spread in total offense, when it comes to scoring offense, the teams are quite close, with only three spots in the rankings separating the two. How come? Patrick Garbin is happy to give you an answer to that question. This in particular should make you uneasy about Georgia’s chances: “This season, Michigan State has averaged 24.3 yards per kickoff return (15th in the FBS), 11.2 yards per punt return (25th), and has scored SIX touchdowns via return.”

… the Spartans seem to have a healthy respect for Georgia, especially the Bulldogs’ defense.

“We’re excited because a lot of us have aspirations to play in the NFL and a lot of us have aspirations to move Michigan State into one of the top teams in the country,” said quarterback Kirk Cousins, a senior and an NFL prospect. “And to do that you’ve gotta be able to line up against NFL-type talent, you’ve gotta be able to play big-time teams like Georgia and prove that you belong.”

Michigan State’s defense is actually ranked fifth nationally, two spots behind Georgia. And there are plenty of other good defenses in the Big Ten. But Cousins said the Bulldogs would have “one of the best, if not the best defense in the Big Ten.”

Cousins got a few snaps in the 2009 Capital One Bowl, but he granted that this Georgia defense is on a different level than the one he faced back then.

“When you look at their team they’re big, they’re fast, they’re everything you look for in a defense,” Cousins said. “Obviously the headliner is No. 29 with the way he’s played on the edge all year. What’s impressive about him is he wasn’t really a big name starting the season. So when you don’t even have the hype to start and you finish with all the accolades and the attention he’s received, it shows how good of a player he really is. He’s as good a player as we’ve played all year, and he’ll be a whale to contain.”

Aaron Murray agrees.

“There’s no conference like it when it comes to speed,” Murray said of the SEC. “(Michigan State) is one of the best defenses in the country, so I’m excited to see what they have to offer. But I think definitely playing in the SEC helps you when it comes to adjusting to the speed of the game.”

It doesn’t hurt, either, that the Bulldogs’ defense also ranks among the country’s best, Murray said.

“I think the hardest defense we face is every day in practice,” Murray said. “Our guys are unbelievable. (Defensive coordinator Todd Grantham) brings some blitzes I don’t even think are possible with 11 guys on the field. I don’t know how he does it. But our guys are able to think of anything just by facing our guys every day in practice.”

I’m beginning to wonder if one day we’re going to look back on this year’s BCS title game, aka The Rematch, as sort of college football’s Bush v. Gore equivalent. Check out this comment from Andy Staples:

This season’s Alabama-LSU national title game was the tipping point for the anti-playoff crowd. Several leagues were already leaning in the direction of a four-team playoff — strategically called a “plus-one” so dim bulbs won’t realize it’s actually a playoff — but when voters passed over Oklahoma State for an all-SEC rematch, the momentum finally swung in the direction of a bracketed tournament, even if it is a small one… [Emphasis added.]

If there is some form of SEC backlash involved in the playoff movement – and I’m not saying Staples is wrong to suggest there is – boy, are some people going to be disappointed when the SEC puts three schools in a plus-one tourney. (Unless, of course, they limit the number of schools one conference can place in a plus-one, which would speak volumes about Andy’s point.)

… For the sake of argument, let’s say Alabama beats LSU in another generally competitive game, by a margin of anywhere from one point to two touchdowns. In that case, the Crimson Tide will finish the year 12-1 with two or three wins over teams ranked in the final polls (give or take Penn State). LSU will finish 13-1 with four or five wins over teams ranked in the final polls (give or take West Virginia). They’d be be 1-1 against one another, with LSU’s win coming at Alabama. LSU will still be the SEC champion.

Under the circumstances, that’s a formula for a split championship, at worst. (The Coaches’ Poll is contractually obligated to vote the winner of the BCS title game No. 1; as LSU fans are well aware, the Associated Press poll is not.) That wouldn’t be the case if the rematch came as a result of the Tigers and Tide eliminating the competition head-to-head, on the field, leaving no questions and no alternatives. If there happens to be a rematch at the end of a playoff, it’s between two teams who have decisively earned it in a way that Alabama, in the current system, has not. [Emphasis added.]

Don’t you just love that? It’s not the rematch that’s bad; it’s the system which delivered it that’s bad. Nifty bit of circular reasoning there.

Of course the real problem this season isn’t that there’s a rematch in the title game. As Matt backhandedly acknowledges, the real problem is that there’s a debate over which team is the second best.

… That’s not to suggest that Oklahoma State or anyone else has earned a stronger claim on a second chance, either. But as long as that opportunity exists for some teams at the expense of others, the current system belongs in the scrapheap.

And because we can’t decide that issue (and because, let’s not forget, the schools want that TV/BCS money), the solution is to make the clear number one team in the country play more games so that we can all feel better about which school is the runner-up. We’re supposed to take an illogical situation and make it even more illogical.

You can see the slippery slope coming a mile away once this rationale is sanctioned, can’t you? This time it’s about #2 vs. #3. With the plus-one, the next debate will come when the argument is over which team is the nation’s fourth-best and the pressure will return to expand again to solve that debate (even if, say, it comes in a season à la 2005, when there was a clear consensus on the top two teams in the country). In other words, a playoff won’t solve this particular concern any better than what we’ve got now.

My point here isn’t to argue against a plus-one format (even though I expect most to question me on that). I’m okay with one that’s constructed with an eye towards being resistant to further expansion. There’s a convincing case to be made that there should be a better way to deal with the way the 2003 and 2004 seasons played out. But those were situations where the debate centered on more than two teams with a legitimate claim to being considered the best going into the postseason. Now we’re being urged to replace that standard with one that merely asks which teams deserve to show up in a postseason tourney, and that’s a very different animal.

Which means that if this season truly and finally provides the impetus for a D-1 playoff, either the movers and shakers embrace a new, flawed metric for inclusion, or (what I suspect) give it to us with a nudge and a wink that while it’s about what happened in 2011, the facts are unique and they promise with all their hearts that it will never, ever be a factor again. We can believe them, right?

Hey, if you can’t trust the folks who were pushing to expand the basketball tourney to 96 schools until they couldn’t find a broadcast partner willing to pay for the privilege, whom can you trust?